The Pope, “Beware of rejecting Jesus: He is good, merciful, he waits, but in the end, it is He who rejects”

In Santa Marta, Francis warns against the “apologies” that Christians often make up to avoid meeting with Christ: “He invites us to his banquet but we say, “I can’t”

Pope Francis during mass in Santa Marta

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Pubblicato il
06/11/2018

salvatore cernuzio

vatican city

Jesus “is good and merciful”, but he is also “just”. So beware of rejecting him: “If you close the door of your heart from within, He cannot open it, because He is very respectful of our heart”. And to “those who reject Jesus, Jesus waits, he will give a second chance, perhaps a third, a fourth, a fifth... But in the end, he will be the one to reject you”. For Pope Francis the idea that “in the end, Jesus forgives everything” works only to a certain point. In today’s Santa Marta, the Pontiff warns against that attitude of detachment that Christians often use towards Christ, which translates into a “rejection” – either clear-cut, sometimes even “polite” - or into a thousand small “apologies” to avoid “meeting” him perhaps in a work of charity, in prayer or in a concrete person.

How many times do we ask Jesus to excuse us when he “calls us to meet him, to speak, to have a nice talk”, the Pontiff says in his homily, reported by Vatican News. “Each of us - he adds - shall think: in my life, how many times have I felt the inspiration of the Holy Spirit to do a work of charity, to meet Jesus in that work of charity, to go and pray, to change my life, to change it in what is not good? And I have always found a reason to express regret, to reject”.

Just as Luke’s Gospel of today tells the story of a man who organized a great banquet inviting different people. “His servants told the guests: “Come, it is ready! But they all begin to apologize for not going. Some because they bought a field, some because they bought five pairs of oxen, some because they just got married. “Always apologies”. They apologize. Apologizing is the polite word not to say, “I reject”. They reject, but politely”, the Pope explains. “Then the master sends the servants to the street to call the poor, the sick, the lame, the blind and they arrive at the feast”. The passage, says Francis, “ends with the second rejection, but this time coming from the mouth of Jesus. Those who refuses Jesus... Jesus waits, gives a second chance, perhaps a third, a fourth, a fifth... But in the end, He is the one to refuse”.

“This rejection - the Pope incites - must make us think of the times that Jesus calls us; he calls us to celebrate with him, to be close to him, to change our lives. Think about it, he is looking for his closest friends and they refuse! Then he looks for the sick... and they go; maybe someone refuses. But “in the end those who do not reject Jesus or those who are not rejected by Him will enter the Kingdom of God”. Jesus “yes, he is good, he is merciful, but he is just,” the Pontiff clarifies. “And if you close the door of your heart from within, He cannot open it, because He is very respectful of our heart. To refuse Jesus is to close the door from within thus He cannot enter. And none of us, the moment we refuse Jesus, thinks of this: “I’m closing the door to Jesus from within””.

In his homily, the Pope reflected on another aspect: who pays for the banquet? “Jesus does!”. The apostle Paul in the first Reading, shows us “the bill for this feast” by talking about Jesus who “emptied himself, assuming the condition of a servant and humiliating himself until he died on the cross”.Christ paid for the feast “with his life”, yet we - Francis observes - say: “I can’t”. May the Lord, it is the prayer of the Bishop of Rome, “give us the grace to understand the mystery of our hardened hearts, of our obstinacy, of our rejection and the grace to cry”.